


Past, Present and Future Tense

by m4xw3ll (orphan_account)



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Timelines, Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Spoilers, M/M, Steve messes up the timeline even further, deaf!Clint
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-26
Updated: 2019-06-08
Packaged: 2020-02-04 18:59:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 6,952
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18610546
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/m4xw3ll
Summary: Avengers: Endgame Spoilers ahead!Steve really only wanted to put the Infinity Stones back. But a string of bad luck made him stay in the 2012 timeline - which is messed up, and by all means that's his fault. Fixing this timeline seems more and more impossible, what with Loki on the loose, the S.T.R.I.K.E. team under the impression Steve belongs to Hydra, and Bucky somewhere alive and hurting.Steve is not sure if the Avengers need his help with any of those things, but chaos and disorder threaten to take over the world even more and he just can't stand by and do nothing when there are lives on the line.





	1. Back In Order

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, so last warning: there are major spoilers for Avengers: Endgame ahead. Proceed with caution.  
> Also the tags may change as the story goes on, but this is what my premise told me to write down.

Putting the stones back into their places was probably the hardest thing Steve ever had to do. It would be so easy to make different choices, to stay in the past looking at Peggy after he put back the space down in the basement of Camp Leigh. To take her dancing. But how would he have explained himself being there?

The most unfamiliar place was probably Asgard. Steve was going to miss Mjolnir. It felt like a good weapon and like it could be a real asset in future fights. It also gave him bonus points when he calmed down a furious Jane Foster enough to inject her with the liquid reality stone. He also had to run for his life because apparently, you need to give someone a better explanation than "It'll be fine" when injecting them with something that would possibly kill them. 

Space really was something he needed to get used to.

There weren't just planets like Earth or Asgard, but Morag as well. A hostile, violent planet that tried to kill him. Just like the black mercenary (or whatever he was) tried to when Steve put back the orb holding the power stone.

And planets like Vormir, which were so otherworldly (no pun intended) Steve wouldn't have ever imagined they could exist. Just like he couldn't have imagined the Red Skull being there, guiding him to the cliff, telling him how to give back the soul stone. It took Steve longer than usual to shake this kind of uneasiness.

2012, on the other hand, was something he was familiar with. He wasn't back then, having woken up only a few weeks prior to the New York battle. Everything still seemed so new and like he had a lot to learn and catch up on. Almost 70 years on ice really put things in a whole different perspective.

If anyone had told him back then that there weren't only aliens but sorcerers … okay, after all he had seen he probably wouldn't have been too surprised. But as the Ancient One looked him in the eye and thanked him for bringing the stone back (and the best wishes Bruce had given her through Steve's words), he didn't feel like she was only a sorceress. She was something completely different. Like Vormir.

"Time to get you back," he told the suitcase still holding the mind stone.

Which would be a very weird experience for the past Avengers. The sceptre was gone, destroyed when they had to get the mind stone out of it. And this time around, hopefully it would be safe from Hydra, or from Tony's intention of building a murder robot.

Which meant that Vision would never exist, and Steve really had to wrap his head around that possibility. Not only that, but Pietro and Wanda would never get their powers. Which wasn't necessarily a bad thing if that meant Pietro could be with his sister instead of giving his own life for someone he barely knew in a fight so crazy Steve still didn't believe in floating cities.

Time travel was tricky. So many things could – and did – go wrong, but other things could go right because of it. Steve still had a hard time grasping that concept. What the other Him would do once he woke up? Would he actually believe what Steve said about Bucky?

As he sneaked into the Avengers Tower through the back door, he actually managed to steer clear of all the commotion caused by him and Tony earlier. Steve pressed his lips together tightly. Maybe in this timeline everything would be different – or better, even Thanos. Maybe Tony didn't have to die here.

Past Him still was unconscious as Steve looked around, trying to figure out where to put the mind stone. Could he just go upstairs to Clint and Natasha? Or downstairs to Tony and Thor? It seemed wrong to just lay it down next to an unconscious Captain America and haul ass.

"Loki!"

Steve flinched as he heard Natasha's voice. He didn't have time to fully turn around, look up to where her voice was from and explain that he wasn't, in fact, Loki. He barely had time to move a muscle when something hit him in the back, sending jolts of electricity through his body.

The floor came closer quickly and Steve tried – he really tried to prevent this. But then his head connected with the floor, broken shards of glass scraping against his cheek, and his muscles twitched uncontrollably. Somewhere between this and Clint and Natasha catching up with him, he went unconscious.


	2. Past, Present and Future Tense

" _Where's the Tesseract?_ "

" _How did he know about Bucky?_ "

" _My brother must have expanded his skill set. He shouldn't be able to hold an illusion for this long while unconscious_."

Steve groaned as he came to, consciousness slowly seeping through him. His muscles felt heavy, like he hadn't used them in years yet they somehow still were there, and his head was all but splitting. The electricity had left his body after he had put Mjolnir back into its place in the other Asgard, so the thing he got hit with knocked him out flat.

Steve's vision was blurry for the first few seconds after opening his eyes, and he tried blinking to correct that. There were numerous people in the room with him, a white ceiling with artificial light that didn't help his massive headache, and some wild hand movements by a few of these people. Voices without words reached him, and after a few seconds he was able to concentrate on them.

"Ugh," he said, and tried to lift his hand to rub his temples. He didn't get very far, though. A metallic _clank_ indicated something was wrong even before Steve felt his wrist yanked down again. He found his hands tied to a reinforced metal chair with equally reinforced handcuffs, which was … smart. Very uncomfortable, but smart.

Another thing disturbing him, even more than finding himself restrained, was that the Time-Space-GPS Tony had built was missing.

"Guys," Natasha said and stepped into his field of vision to his left. "He's waking up."

"I'll get Fury." A rather familiar voice, then footsteps, then a low  _swoosh_ as a door opened and closed again automatically somewhere behind him.

Natasha crossed her arms in front of her chest, an arched eyebrow and puckered lips indicating she was not happy and very sceptical towards this situation. Thor and Tony rushed next to her, a curious look on the latter's face. Like he just got slapped in the face with a puzzle he couldn't solve.

On the other side of his chair was Steve. Well, past Steve. Past him. _That was so weird_. Hands on his hips, shield on his back and his posture one Steve knew all too well; that's how he positioned himself if he wasn't sure about how serious of a threat his opponent really was. Making himself bigger, just in case. He had never been on the receiving end of this pose, though. Was that really supposed to be intimidating?

Yet he had the same curiosity on his face as Tony.

"Do you know where you are?" Clint asked as he stepped next to Steve.

"Ugh," Steve repeated, letting his head fall against the high back rest, colliding rather unpleasantly with a dull sound. He exhaled slowly, trying to focus on what happened. "Look, I can explain."

"I hope so, brother," Thor nodded.

Steve tried shaking his head, but a sudden rush of queasiness and the urge to throw up on the next best thing – himself, in this case – stopped him. "I'm not Loki."

Clint scoffed, and Tony raised an eyebrow. "Quit playing, brother," Thor said, a look that could only be described as disappointed and sad on his face. It felt like years Steve had seen that look on him, and he wasn't happy to see it again now.

His vision focused on something else, though. He lifted one hand as far as he could, fingers stretched and pointed toward a small table behind Thor. The God of Thunder frowned, and he should; after all, he knew that gesture.

"What is he doing?" Tony asked, twirling a finger in Steve's general direction. "Is he speaking ASL now?"

"That looks so much different." Clint shook his head, then pointed at his hearing aids when Tony shot him a confused look. "Tip: don't ever let an angry Russian sign at you."

Natasha chuckled. Steve turned his head barely enough to look at her. To _really_ look at her. Even now he could see how jaded she already was, but she still looked so much younger than the Nat he knew. And she was alive. It almost physically hurt Steve to look at her face.

"Oh, I thought you were just reading lips," Steve – past Steve – intervened.

Steve couldn't say how much he had missed that voice, knowing he was never going to hear it again. Their last conversations still had been strained, although they somehow had come to trust each other again. But now Tony was dead, and this one only was an echo of what he would eventually become. If someone would let Steve get back to the past and not fuck up this timeline further than he already had.

And in the next second, every conversation these past Avengers were about to have was cut short. The hammer Thor had placed on the table right next to a small vase wobbled a bit and for a moment, Steve felt his stomach drop. He wasn't sure it would work, at all. Then Mjolnir rushed into Steve's hand.

It was heavier than he remembered, but that was probably because his muscles still felt stiff after that much electricity had run through him. But the weight dropped significantly after a few seconds and the electric tingle he grew accustomed to in the short time he actually wielded Mjolnir rushed through him once more.

And the Avengers – well, the past Avengers – fell silent. For a few seconds everyone's eyes were on the hammer before they moved on to the other Steve. Except for Thor, whose gaze remained on future Steve.

He leaned forward. "You're not Loki," he concluded quietly, his eyes still wide as he looked back and forth between Steve's face and Mjolnir. "You can't possibly be."

"You wouldn't have believed me otherwise."

"Probably not, no."

A quiet  _swoosh_ indicated the opening of a door again, and this time Steve saw a woman dressed like a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent enter the room – Maria Hill, though a younger and slightly more composed looking version –, followed by the coat twirling Nick Fury. His voice boomed, filling out the entire room, "Who was stupid enough to give Loki a weapon?"

"This is not Loki," Thor explained as he reached for Mjolnir. "My brother is many things, but worthy of my hammer isn't one of them." He held Fury's gaze with ease.

The director of S.H.I.E.L.D folded his arms behind his back. "Then explain what the fuck is happening here."

Steve really had to grow accustomed to seeing him like that again, didn't he?

"So you're saying that – what, we got two Steve's now? Twice the patriotism?" Tony frowned and leaned over the bed, poking Steve's chest with one finger. "He's real, though. Awful." How he could maintain that playful tone was beyond Steve.

Another person entered the room, this time more slowly and unsure of himself. Steve had almost forgotten how … timid Bruce Banner had been in the past. Picking on his sleeves, posting himself very carefully at the foot end of the bed, scanning the room for possible threats that could set the Hulk off. What would he say if Steve told him they were to become one person?

"These two Caps can't exist in one place at the same time," Tony rambled on, turning around and walking a half circle around the bed until he could poke the past Steve, too. "By all means, that's not possible. Not unless my dad had found a method to clone Capsicle here, and I know for a fact he didn't."

"How so?" Clint inquired, raising both eyebrows in the process. "He could have kept one as a … pet."

"He never would have shut up about it."

"What are you trying to say?" Past Steve frowned as he followed Tony's finger with his eyes.

Said finger drew an invisible line in the air. "That's your timeline – 1945 you're frozen in the ice, then you come back, and a few weeks later you fight Loki and his army with us. One straight line." The finger pointed to Future Steve. "That right there, that's not you. Or rather, it's not past or present you. He isn't even slightly confused by the people in this room, and past you would have been. I mean, you just met Thor like, yesterday?"

Past Steve nodded.

"And you never tried to grab the hammer before?"

Past Steve shook his head.

"So this Steve in the bed met us, held the hammer before, so that means …" Tony paused, looking at everyone in this room. "Why are you staring at me like that? Isn't it obvious?"

Natasha finally gave in. "You're implying he's from the future."

Bruce laughed quietly. His arms were still crossed and two fingers picked on the fabric of his dark brown shirt, shoulders still hunched, too. His eyes didn't smile, though. "Time travel? That's crazy, even for us."

" _Back To The Future_ style." Even Clint laughed now. "He broke the first, rule, though – no talking to your past self. And not getting captured by your past friends. Future friends? Present friends? Are we friends, Cap?"

Past Steve shrugged. "Comrades, I'd say."

"This is already confusing," Maria sighed as he held her head in one hand.

"What does that imply about Bucky?" Clearly, past Steve could focus on as much else as his own present ass when it came to Bucky. "You said he was alive. You told me, right before you … this is embarrassing. I got knocked out by myself." It was almost hilarious, but Steve didn't feel like laughing.

"Glad we all agree on this, I'd like to go back to my time, now," he stopped them before a discussion could spark. Everyone knew there was no stopping Tony Stark when he started talking, no matter the timeline. "I just came back to give you the mind stone and I'll be on my way now."

"The what?" Tony frowned at him.

"I had a suitcase with me, and since it's not here with me I hope you still have it in your possession," Steve explained. "Inside was the mind stone. We took it out of Loki's sceptre to, uh …" Shit, nobody ever told him how much he could actually talk about the future. "We needed it, and now we don't. Not anymore. I was trying to give it back."

"And the Tesseract?" Nick Fury stepped forward, hands behind his back and a scowl on his forehead. "You're keeping that?"

Approximately at this point, Steve realized in how much shit this timeline was.


	3. Looking Forward

Loki didn't know where to go.

The only thing he knew was that he needed to get away from here, although _here_ varied a lot lately. First it was Asgard; punishment probably worse than death would await him if he were to return there. Then New York, or rather the planet of Earth, which he had all but sought to destroy if that meant he could wear a crown. And now … Thanos.

Which was a bit more difficult than going away from _places_.

Thanos seemed to be everywhere, all at once, even though he never seemed to leave his throne. His name was enough to let Loki visibly shudder in memory of his mind being pulled apart and pieced together over and over again, until nothing good was left. Only the vague feeling of justified revenge, rage and the desire to put himself above others so the pain would go away.

Yes, he had wanted a throne. It was his birthright, after all. But at what cost?

He stretched out his legs and looked around the rock he had holed up on. It was a dead moon of an equally dead planet somewhere half a galaxy away from Earth, yet a faint atmosphere miraculously held up. That's all he knew about this place, other than surviving here would have been difficult if he were a mere human being.

He looked at the Tesseract he cradled in his hands, not wanting to let go of it for the fear of being left defenceless and stranded on this empty rock. If he had felt any more sane than this, he maybe would have had a solution for his problems.

But as of now, his mind was a mess.

Thoughts raced and every time he closed his eyes, he saw the battle and his loss play out again, his army dying and the Hulk, this big green monster, blurred by his vision as the beast swung him over his head and Loki crashed into the floor, again and again and again.

He almost threw up.

But this dead rock, right here? It wasn't his end, it couldn't possibly be. Even if he had nothing, he still had the Tesseract, and there had to be a way to escape Thanos' grasp. There was no version of his life where he would willingly subject to this monster even more fearsome than the Hulk ever again.

No, the sun definitely would shine on him again.

All Loki needed was a plan.

*

Steve got tired of being cuffed to a chair. Of Natasha watching him like she didn't know who he was, of Tony rambling on and on about time travel, Bruce nodding and Fury eyeing him as if he wanted to shoot him. Of having to look at himself.

Past Steve leaned closer to inspect his new suit, a curious look on his face. "Is that proper body armor?"

"Turns out, Hydra _is_ attacking us with a pocket knife."

That was the first time past Steve's frown lifted a bit. "Huh."

"Can you take these off now?" He nodded to the cuffs binding him to the chair.

Natasha hadn't moved. She was like a statue. Like a not very comfortable statue in this room full of people she hadn't known for very long. Now that Steve had spend years upon years befriending and getting to know her, her mask crumbled right in front of him.

"That's not for me to decide," she answered, but anything to get her rid of him would probably be pleasant.

"Tony," Steve called out.

Tony turned to him with a huge frown upon his face, a look Past Steve imitated perfectly. As if they were to say, _did you just call him_ that _with_ this _voice?_

Steve internally groaned. Right, they didn't get along at first. Even after the battle of New York, it had taken time to form a proper work-friendly relationship. "They're probably reinforced to hold enhanced people like me down, right?" Steve nodded to the cuffs. "And I know you have buttons all over the place. So could you press one of those to open them?"

"Why?" Clint joined them again, this time with a cup of something smelling like coffee, but way stronger. He nodded towards Natasha and she joined him, taking the mug out of his hands and making a face after she took a sip.

Steve decided to humour him with his answer. "Because they're uncomfortable and I need both hands to pry my Time-Space-GPS from Stark and use it again so I can go back home."

"What about my brother?" Thor intervened. His pacing told Steve he was probably nervous about what was going to happen next. "You know where he is, right?"

"No idea." Steve shook his head. "We messed enough with your timeline, and I'm sorry that happened. I don't want to cause another end-of-the-world-battle."

Thor nodded. "With the Bifrost destroyed and the Tesseract gone, I don't have a way off this planet."

"Give it a couple of weeks, they're working on the Bifrost now," Steve could at least assure him that it wouldn't take forever for Thor to go home again.

"Oh, you can crash here if you want – just not literally, yeah?" Tony offered, not bothering to look up from this small piece of tech he had invented. Would invent. This was so complicated.

"Hold on," Natasha intervened. "What do you mean, _we_?"

"And you're not going to help us?" Steve knew that look his past self gave him. Captain America is Disappointed in You Specifically.

Steve probably made this fight his own when he started messing with this timeline. When he told Sitwell "Hail Hydra" and then fought himself for the sceptre. And if there was one thing going absolutely against his morals, it was walking away from a fight. Captain America didn't have to dare him.

"Fine," he gave in. "But first get me out of those cuffs."

*

Nobody had told Steve the rules of talking to his past self about … well, everything. But Sam, an avid movie goer, had made him sit through a couple of Q&A videos, so Steve's go-to answer to questions about the future usually related to "spoilers" and contained absolutely zero information.

Nick Fury was pissed with him, he could tell. After a long talk about how Steve wasn't going to blow up New York and the Avengers swearing to take him out if he proved to be a threat, Fury stormed off at some point, his black coat and Maria Hill trailing behind him.

A vacation would be good for him, but Steve knew he wasn't taking one. He probably was in the middle of setting a few more spies on him, just as he did when Steve had moved to Washington, D.C. He himself still had a Hydra-ridden organisation to run, after all. Steve wondered if he should have told him.

"This thing," Tony said and rounded the the kitchen counter where Steve, his past self and Natasha sat at the moment. "Time-Space-GPS, you called it? It's genius. Did I make that?" He turned away to look through the cupboards for a mug and made himself a cup of coffee.

Steve nodded when Tony briefly looked over his shoulder.

"Of course I did." One thing he hadn't missed about Tony was his smug grin. Okay, in light of recent events he actually _had_ missed it. "Do you even know how to operate a smartphone?"

"A what?" Past Steve frowned.

"Of course," Future Steve answered, at the same time as past him.

Past Steve shot him a look as if he sincerely believed his future self just made shit up. He couldn't blame him. Everything around here had been so new and foreign after just a few weeks out of the ice. But to Future Steve, everything happening around here seemed totally natural. He even missed some of the newer technological advancements the following years would bring. Not drones, though. They were a serious pain in the ass.

"That's not the most important thing right now," Past Steve said, turning back to his future self. "You were saying?"

"Right." Tony nodded and grabbed his mug.

"Promise me I'll get it back in one piece," he called out, but Tony only made a wavering gesture with his hand and hopped into the elevator. Back to the lab, where Bruce undoubtedly waited for him.

Now came the tricky part. Steve knew a lot of stuff about the past that would have made his life infinitely easier if he had been aware of them back then. The question was, how much could he tell these people? How much would they believe him? And most importantly, how would it affect the future?

Past Steve was particularly interested in Bucky, of course. And if he had any say in that, he would have prioritized his best friend over basically the rest of the world – or galaxy –, too. Which was exactly why he'd sat Past Steve and Natasha down first.

"Bucky is alive and operates under the name of Winter Soldier," he explained, grabbing his own mug of coffee with both hands.

Natasha raised an eyebrow, but he knew she recognized that name. After all, she had been the one to tell Steve about him. Past Steve, on the other hand, looked like he just got slapped in the face. "The who? Where is he right now?"

"I don't know."

"What do you mean, you _don't know_?" Past Steve leaned in closer. "You're from the future, you –"

"That doesn't mean I know everything that's going on," Steve interrupted him.

Natasha chuckled. "Is that stick up your ass getting on your own nerves?" It wasn't clear who she was talking to, but both Steves shot her an offended look. "Right. So, the Winter Soldier. Old ghost story. You sure it's James?"

Okay, that was a new piece of information. Something his Natasha never had disclosed before - that she personally knew Bucky, from ... well, that he still didn't know. But he could guess and the options weren't the nicest. Steve tried to keep his face in check, just in case she realized that this surprised him. "Definitely," he answered. "We fought him in Washington, right before we … uh. This is getting a bit more complicated."

It was worth it, after all. Seeing Natasha this surprised really had lifted Steve's spirits, even if he achieved it with information that made her whole world crumble. But he felt like they believed him. And he felt that they needed all the help they could get if they wanted to make it out alive.

"What's up?" Clint stalked into the kitchen area, setting the empty pot of coffee down. Three pairs of eyes watched him closely. "Anything new in the future? Why are you looking at me like that?"

"We got a trip to Washington ahead," Natasha explained, crossed her arms on the counter and leaned forward. A small smile played around her lips. "You're not busy, are you?"

"Give the VA a visit," Steve felt the need to recommend to his past self.

The frown he got in return almost made him choke on a laugh. "Why?"

"Sam Wilson. He's the guy who runs it. If you're ever in trouble, turn to him."

"Why would I?"

Steve felt it best not to comment on the friendship and trust Sam and him shared. That was something Past Steve would have to experience on his own. "You'll see."

"And where will you go?" Past Steve wanted to know. "With all that time travel, did you … I mean, have you met –"

"Peggy?" Steve intervened. Watching himself scramble for words wasn't fun. "No. Yes. Sort of. I mean … I saw her. She didn't see me."

"Will you go back to her?"

"I can't say I haven't considered it," Steve had to admit, but shook his head. "I can't. You know, all those years I spent trying to move on and I felt like that really got somewhere. I got Bucky back, and a new team. I can't just leave them."

"But you can leave your best girl?" Past Steve frowned at him. He seemed to do that a lot.

"You don't understand this now, but I promise you – you will. Have faith in people." He stood up. "Now, I need to find out what Tony did to my Time-Space-GPS."


	4. A Bright Future

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Check the updated tags!
> 
> Sorry for the slow update, I had a lot on my mind lately. But it's getting better now and I planned a lot for this fic, which I now have to put on paper. So hopefully, there'll be more regular updates. Also thanks a lot for all the encouraging comments! That means a lot!

Xandar's capitol looked just about like any other on a thousand different planets. Not that Loki had that much experience, but he had come around in the thousand years he lived. Sure, the buildings were a bit different and the pink and green and purple people weren't found everywhere in the galaxy, but the busy bustling in the streets and the technology was pretty similar to those of other planets. And most of all, there was anonymity everywhere.

For him as much as anybody else. Though Loki was pretty sure the Allfather would have taken Thor home and tasked him and pretty much every Asgardian he could spare with finding Loki. Even his disguise wouldn't do him much good in this case, but maybe it would buy him time. Make him blend in with others.

Which he was pretty sure he could manage when he ran into his mirror image in one of the side streets. Though the woman dressed in a short green dress and high boots of the same dark tone had blond hair, she was as pale as himself and something he could only describe as a mischievous grin on her face.

She stopped in her tracks and raised an eyebrow when she spotted Loki. A pinkish man bumped into her and profusely apologized, then rushed past them. "Curious," she said and tilted her head, loosely crossing her arms in front of her.

"Indeed." Loki nodded, tilted his head to the other side and smoothed his green and black dress with a small gesture. "Do I know you?" Asgardians all had a distinct … smell to them. Loki could identify them almost immediately and even shapeshifting only did so much to hide their mark. This one's was weak, as one might obtain during a brief visit, so he wasn't entirely sure as to what to do with this information.

The woman seemed equally taken aback. "I was just about to ask the same thing."

Something about her was familiar, Loki found, and it wasn't just her scent – or mark, or whatever one might call it. He didn't know if it was her look or the aura of power surrounding her, or if he had even seen her face somewhere before. Loki knew he should be careful, but he always had means to get away in a pinch, which was an incredibly calming feeling. He wouldn't be stuck here like with Thanos or even on Asgard, subjected to the whims and warfare of the Allfather.

"You're not Asgardian, are you?" Loki found himself asking. The high female voice seemed a bit unfamiliar after not using it for so long. But he was pretty sure he hit the tone – a mixture of curiosity and suspicion – pretty well.

"No more than you," the woman shook her head.

And suddenly it dawned on Loki who exactly he found himself talking to. On Xandar, of all planets, not even one of the Nine Realms. "Not anymore then," he commented. "But I believe your sister still holds that citizenship. I even heard Lorelei planned an uprising all on her own."

If anything, the woman didn't seem surprised. She huffed, tilted back her head and smirked a little. No, not surprised. She seemed proud. Loki was sure of her identity now.

"Nice to meet you, Amora."

"And you, Loki Odinson."

Loki's mouth twitched. He was about to correct her that even though he might have been the prince of Asgard – probably still was, even after everything that had happened – he wasn't an Odinson. No, that dubious honour belonged to Thor alone. But he was all but stranded on this planet with no way to go home, so correcting a potential ally was the worst he could do if her mindset about his current position in Asgard could be any help.

"What brings you so far from the Nine Realms, and in a woman's body no less?"

*

"So … where do you want to start?"

Steve tried burying his head into his arms. He could still hear Natasha's voice, though. And hear her sitting down next to him on one of the leather couches in Stark's … living room? Or did he call it a lounge? Or another 21st century term he hadn't heard of?

It was hard keeping his head straight, after everything that had happened. Three weeks ago, he was crashing a plane into the ice and yesterday he had been fighting aliens while trying not to get distracted by the colourful and loud advertisements on various billboards. He should be given a medal just for that.

And if that wasn't weird enough already – _aliens_ , man – a version of his future self had been holding this god's hammer, talking to them as if he knew everyone for years already and strolled around like Stark Tower was just one minor vacation and not even one of the most technologically advanced buildings in existence. Well, and then there was the alien god who had fought his brother for a magical sceptre to close a magical portal where all the probably magical aliens had come from. But with everything that had happened, this seemed like a side note.

Not to mention Bucky was still alive and held hostage in a freezer by the fascist organisation that had infiltrated Peggy's life work. At this point, Steve wouldn't be surprised by anything else, he was pretty sure of it.

"I have absolutely no idea," he concluded, briefly looking up to see Natasha with now straightened hair and the usual look that told him nothing about her thoughts on her face.

"You could try sticking your head into the fridge," Clint suggested and basically fell down on another couch which lined up with Steve's in a 90 degree angle. He looked rather uncomfortable in his tight black and violet leather jacket, especially with the way he wore equally dark sweatpants and no shoes. Then again, Natasha didn't seem to even own comfortable clothes. Maybe the future was weird like that.

"I would greatly appreciate it if you didn't use the air ventilation system as a travel method, Mr. Barton," JARVIS' voice came from the ceiling. Clint grinned.

"Listen to the man." Stark pointed at Clint and made his way past them to the kitchen lining up in the back of the lounge. Living room? No, Steve decided to stick with lounge. For one, it was shorter and didn't make his head smoke. Easy and simple.

"Aren't you supposed to keep tracks on our friend from the future?" Natasha asked and raised an eyebrow as she watched Stark go through the fridge.

"I'm not Doc Brown," Stark decided to confuse Steve even more. When he saw the frown and tilted head, he actually shook his head like it was Steve's fault not to be on top of current pop culture references. "I don't tell him to go around not talking to his past self, because apparently that's not how it works. I didn't invent time travel." He shrugged and pulled out something that looked like it had been a burger in it's past life.

"You did," Clint interjected, pointing an accusatory finger at Stark. "The other Steve told me so. You better get to work, there's a night in 1998 I want to undo."

Stark huffed and spewed pieces of onion and salad all over the counter, only to wipe them away with the sleeve of his grey sweater. "Future me is a tiny bit smarter than present me, which is a still a lot smarter than you. And way more fashionable. So I'm not letting you pop off to the nineties if there's even a tiny chance you come back with a choker and butterfly clasps."

Clint pouted. He waved his hands at Stark, which could either mean something completely harmless or Steve would have to work on his ASL to properly identify insults in the foreseeable future. Stark turned on JARVIS's translator during half of it and Steve looked around for a child in case he had to cover some ears.

"Rude," Stark commented.

"By the way," Natasha interjected. "Where _is_ Steve?" She frowned and looked right at him for a second, then back to Stark. "The other one."

"JARVIS?"

Steve frowned and looked to the ceiling, where the disembodied voice seemed to be coming from for most of the time. "Mr. Rogers currently resides in the lounge and in the laboratory," the voice answered.

So it really _was_ a lounge. Ha.

"I think we should do what he – well, I – told us to," Steve managed to finally answer Natasha's question. "Go to Washington, D.C. Work for S.H.I.E.L.D. Some undercover stuff."

"And how do you make them believe you're actually Hydra?"

Natasha sounded way too sceptical for Steve to answer with some good-natured optimism. If he was completely honest with himself, he wasn't sure he could do it. "You're a spy, you could teach me the basics. We pull it off for as long as possible, foil a few of their plans, then make our exit. We'll work out the details along the way."

But all that plan achieved was making Natasha shake her head and Clint laugh at him. "You have no idea how a spy actually works."

*

Steve remembered his first meeting with Dr. Erskine as he watched Bruce from the examination table. Things had changed since the 40's, though. Everything was cleaner and looked way more sterile – a good thing, probably. And Bruce had no resemblance to Dr. Erskine, except maybe for his calm demeanour. He seemed at home in this type of laboratory.

"I'm not a physician," he explained and turned back towards Steve after rummaging through his equipment, an empty syringe in hand. "Still, I'd like to draw your blood and consult with a specialist."

"Why?" Steve asked. He had already said yes to an examination, and the other Steve had, too, even though he had been way more reluctant. This version of him hadn't known Bruce for more than a day or two.

"I'd like to compare your blood to that of our Steve Rogers." Bruce gestured to him to roll up his sleeve. The other Steve had lent him some clothes, which naturally fit, so he wouldn't have to walk around in his armour all the time. "To see if there are differences in our universe, or whatever else it may hold. Even if it's identical, that could tell us a lot. Think about it – you told us about parallel universes, our futures, stuff we shouldn't be able, or allowed, to know. There's so much we could learn from a sample from you."

Steve frowned. That science-y stuff wasn't something he was familiar with, but he believed Bruce's explanation. Curiosity was written all over his face and he seemed eager, so who would he be to turn down a friend's request? Even if that friend didn't know what a bond they would eventually form. Steve held out his now bare arm. "Go ahead."

After drawing his blood, Bruce turned back to his equipment to label and store the blood sample. "You seem to know all of us in the future," he remarked.

Steve frowned. "I do," he answered, wondering why Bruce brought this up just now. His best guess would be that he was curious – not just about the blood sample. Everyone except Natasha had approached him in one way or another about their future already. This seemed to be Bruce's turn.

"That means I'll live at least eleven years." A smile was on his lips for the first time in forever, at least what Steve could remember. "That's nice to know."

Deciding what he could tell others and what not was one of the most difficult decisions Steve ever had to make. Nobody knew what could happen if he told someone even a minor detail that could become important. How the person would react, how they would act from then on, how that would affect their life. Bruce seemed like someone who would understand all the implications that could follow this, so Steve decided to share his thoughts with him. "I don't know what to tell you, honestly," he finished.

The smile had faded from Bruce's face. "I know," he nodded in agreement. "It's a difficult decision. You don't have to tell me anything."

"I want to," Steve insisted. He turned over some details in his head – what could he say that would actually help Bruce, without compromising his or other people's future? If there was an answer to this question, Steve hadn't found it yet. "I can tell you this," he settled on something. "You're important and you're stronger than you might know yet – not only physical. Start looking at everything – and I mean _everything_ – like a solution, not like a problem."

Those had been Bruce's own words in the future, so it might be possible to help him with himself, sort of. Steve still hadn't figured out how to act in the past yet, and he doubted he would be able to. But he couldn't just leave a friend and team member hanging, could he?

Bruce seemed to turn over the words in his mind. He held both arms in front of his body, picking at the long-sleeved shirt with his fingers and shuffling nervously. It was clear how uncomfortable he felt, and that he wasn't really sure what to answer. Steve couldn't blame him, and he wouldn't demand an answer that might be a dishonest one.

"Where will you go, now that the Infinity Stones are safe again?" Bruce finally asked.

"I haven't decided yet, but Earth might not be the best place for me," Steve answered. "I think I'll talk to Thor."

Bruce nodded in agreement. "With all that Loki business, he's in dire need of help."

Steve couldn't help the small smile. Not only that, but Thor always had been someone he trusted – well, after he and Tony had been finished bashing their heads in. And his one trip to space had lacked some serious sightseeing. What better way to make up than to help the God of Thunder?

 


End file.
